You All, Everybody
by Juliannek
Summary: Charlie Pace just drowned, giving hope of rescure to his fellow islanders. His drowning lead him to another phase of his life. Or is it death?
1. The Beginning of the End

**Author's Note:**

**Hello everyone! This is my first Lost fanfic, so there might be some bumps to work out along the way.  
The story begins at the end of Season 3. Since I am too stubborn to accept the fact that Charlie is dead, I decided to create this story in his honor.**

**I hope you enjoy it! Reviews are most welcome.**

Not Penny's boat.  
Not Penny's boat.  
Not Penny's… boat…

_ Please understand…_

The water began to crush his lungs. The burning sensation of holding your breath too long began to take him, except he had never been in a situation with no way to get air once more. No way of hope. No way of rescue. No way of surviving. It is inevitable to drown in a tank full of water with no way to attain air except for hundreds of feet above you. The only thing to do was die. Slowly. Painfully. Knowing your fate as you try to prepare yourself for the unknown. Is there an afterlife? If there is, where will I go? Heaven? Hell?

Your time is not now._

* * *

_

_ Bacon. I smell bacon. The only reason I would be smelling bacon would be if I was in Heaven, right? Hell wouldn't have bacon. That would be ridiculous. Unless I can't eat the bacon. Then I'm in hell. Maybe this is some kind of ongoing torture. Satan dangles the bacon in front of my nose letting my smell it, and just as I am about to taste it, he pulls away. Dear God, please don't let this be hell._

Charlie's eyes fluttered open. Light was peeking through the dark curtains covering his window illuminating the room. _His _room. This was his room from when he was a child. He was in his parent's house.

_ Bloody hell…_

Charlie sat up. He was lying in his old bed, the one he and Liam used to share. Obviously, it was only built for one small child. The blanket didn't reach past Charlie's ankles. That's when he noticed he was fully clothed in pajamas with no sight of his island attire. He was scrubbed clean, hair washed, fresh clothes, brushed teeth.

"Charlie! Charlie, honey, are you awake?"

Charlie jumped hearing that voice. His mother. What was going on? He was in his parent's house hearing his mother call him for breakfast, knowing quite well that he was dead. At least, supposed to be dead.

_ Purgatory. Dammit, I'm in purgatory._

"Charlie?" his mother called again.

"Uh, yes, I-I'm awake," Charlie answered back, his voice trembling. He looked down to his hands. Shaking. Something caught his eye. His ring was missing. The ring Liam gave him. It was gone. He had left it in Aaron's cradle before he left… There was a tan line on his finger where it had been. The island could not have been a dream. This was proof. Maybe not proof for anyone but himself, but it was truth enough. The island was real. Everything that happened on it was real. His death was real.

But why was he here?

"Breakfast, Charlie. Hurry, it's getting cold."

Charlie wasn't hungry. He felt sick. This was all so wrong. Everything was wrong.

_ I need to go back…_

This was all too much for Charlie to handle. He slumped back onto his bed eyes tightly closed, breaking into a cold sweat. His breaths came in short gasps, his fingers clenched against his palm, nails digging into his skin. A soft patter of footsteps was heard as his mother came shuffling into the room. A small gasp came from Megan Pace as she sat down onto his bed. She began asking questions, dabbing Charlie's forehead with a towel. He could no longer hear. He could no longer see. Nothing made sense. Focusing was impossible.

You time is not now.


	2. Dreamers and Demons

**Author's Note:**

**I apologize if this is a boring chapter. It's sort of filler, I suppose. But I promise things will pick up in the next chapters. Seriously.**

**Oh, and I don't own Lost in any way. At all. Sadly. **

**

* * *

**

_Go into the room with the flashing yellow light. Flip a switch. The light stops flashing. Everyone gets rescued. Except for me. I drown. I drowned._

"I don't understand… He was sleeping soundly, I called him for breakfast, and when I walked into his room, he was in a cold sweat and shouting names I have never heard before."

Megan Pace's voice was just above a whisper. She glanced back to her son who was breathing heavily on his bed, still unresponsive. He would stir every few minutes, giving her reassurance that he was still somewhat alive. She was hesitant to call the hospital. She hated hospitals. Besides, it was probably just a fever, nothing to worry about. A simple head-cold.

"It's not like there is anything wrong with him! He has always been a healthy boy. Just yesterday he was playing ball with Meggie."

A second pair of eyes was staring into Charlie. Liam's eyes. He was just as, if not more, concerned about Charlie than his mother. He and Charlie were more than brothers, they were one person. The two had been inseparable since birth. They had the same desires, same friends, and same life. When Liam was getting into trouble, Charlie was right at his side. When one was hurt, the other's heart ached. They could feel each other's emotions. Except this time, Liam couldn't feel Charlie's pain. It was like Charlie was… dead. Nonexistent.

"Mum, this doesn't feel right," Liam tried to explain. "I normally can, I dunno, sense Charlie's pain, but this time, it's like he's not even there. It's so strange."

"Oh, Liam, don't give me that nonsense now! This is serious! Charlie is very sick," Megan responded, scolding her eldest son. She never thought him to be the type who thought up ridiculous claims. That was always Charlie's place in the family. He would always write silly stories or play make-believe. She just wished he was playing make-believe today. Megan turned away from Liam and walked over to Charlie's bed, gazing nervously at his trembling body. Crossing herself, she began to pray silently. Liam came up behind her, placing a hand on her shoulder.

"He'll be fine, Mum," Liam promised his mother. "I'll go get the car ready."

Megan's head twisted around to stare hard into Liam. The only time she had been to a hospital was when her grandmother was suffering from pneumonia. She could hardly stand up during the visit. Both of her children were home-deliveries. She hadn't even been there when Karen had given birth to her granddaughter. A hospital was where dying people went. Not her son. Now was not the time to be going into a hospital.

"No," was all she said. Her eyes fell back onto her darling Charlie. His eyes were clenched tight as if he was concentrating hard, trying to remember an important detail that was eluding him.

"I'm going to wake him," Megan muttered. She placed a gentle hand on Charlie's arm.

"It's time to—"

Before Megan could finish her sentence, Charlie shot bolt upright, fear written on his weary face.

"CLAIRE!" Charlie cried out, startling Megan and Liam. Charlie began gasping for breath, holding onto his chest, repeating inaudible words. Slowly, his breath steadied. His eyes tried to roll back into his head, but he was fighting to keep them in focus, keep his eyes open.

"D—don't let m—me close my eyes… again…" Charlie panted holding onto his mother for balance. "I don't want to see it…"

* * *

_Another morning, another day spent on the Island. Another day wasted. Just an average day. Jack and Juliet were sitting near the ocean talking about God knows what, Sawyer was buried in another one of his books, Kate and Sun were gathering clams from the water, and Claire was with Aaron. _

_Claire. I miss her. But she's here. So why do I miss her? But I'm not here. Then where am I? Obviously I am here, on the Island. That was a terrible dream I had… Drowning. Desmond. Mikhail. Damn him. I can't believe he did that to me. Except none of that happened. I never ended up in my parent's house. I mean, come on, if I were to die, the last place I would want to end up would be at my family's house. Try somewhere with my band playing a big show. That's where I would be. _

_Okay, Charlie, get it together. Go about your life as normal. Yes, silly Charlie. Silly me. _

"_Charlie!"_

_Who's calling my name…? Ah, Hurley! How could I have missed him? And what's wrong with…_

"_Charlie, everyone is—" Hurley fell to his knees. Now it was visible. He was bleeding from a head wound. His eyes were white._

_Charlie tore his eyes away from Hurley to look for help. Except, everyone was on their knees. With a stream of red running down their face. And eyes whiter than snow._

"_Claire!" Charlie shouted as he ran full speed over to where she had been playing with Aaron. Blood. So much blood…_


	3. The Secret's in the Telling

**Author's Note: Hey guys! Sorry it's taken so long for me to update. I was just trying to make sure this chapter didn't suck. So I worked on it for a long time. I hope you all enjoy it. **

**Oh, and I don't own Lost or any of the characters. Darnit...**

* * *

"I don't know. It looks like a blob to me," Charlie said as he threw his arms up in defeat and leaned back into the red armchair. 

The woman put the card down. Again, her patient was unable to provide her with a sufficient answer. Again, she began to question why he was here. If he wasn't going to cooperate, it was a pointless visit. You must want help in order to obtain help. He didn't want help. She glanced at her watch. Twenty four minutes wasted. Twenty one more minutes until she could get rid of this idiot and go to lunch. Perhaps the visit can be cut short. He isn't making any progress, so why stay? A terrible mind-set to have, but when the patient is being a stubborn nitwit, there is no reason why not. One more try, then it's done.

"Let's try another exercise…" the woman said as she began to dig through the papers littering her desk. "It's called color association. I will say a color and you say the first thing that comes into your mind. Then, we will talk about why your mind went to that object." She found a clean sheet of paper and clicked her pen, ready to record _something_. At this point, she would take anything he had to say, no matter how insane it sounded. 

_Easy enough. He should be able to handle this,_ the woman thought. Then again, she had said that about the ink blots…

"Let's begin. White."

Silence. She stared hard at Charlie. He was closely examining his fingers with a look of concentration and pain written on his face. Progress. After another ten seconds, Charlie opened his mouth.

"Polar bear," he muttered without looking up. The woman reclined, somewhat surprised at this response. Polar bear? That was one of the few answers she had not heard before. 

"And why a polar bear?" she asked sweetly as she scribbled notes.

Charlie didn't move. He sat perfectly still, eyes still focused on his hands as if contemplating whether to answer or not, like he was holding in a dark secret that was trying to escape. Then, slowly, his brown eyes looked up and met hers. 

"There were polar bears on the Island," he whispered.

A blank stare. That was all she gave him. No psycho analysis. No comforting words. No nothing. Nothing but a stare. First of all, why did he go back to the subject of the island? She had already told him it was just a ridiculous dream. He hadn't boarded a plane in the past three months. In fact, he had been at his parents' house that whole time; and unless they had some sort of a brain lapse, Charlie had not left Manchester during that period. Therefore, no crash on an island in the middle of nowhere. Second, polar bears living in the arctic, not on some tropical island. Logic. That was what Charlie was missing. Logic or a few screws. 

Charlie was no longer looking at his therapist. He had gone back to staring at his hands.

* * *

Yes, he thought the visit was going to be a waste of time. Yes, he could have tried harder to be helpful and listen to what she was saying. But the fact was he didn't need a therapist. He needed answers. Real answers about what had happened to him. Not this psychobabble "look-at-these-dots-and-tell-me-you-see-a-flower" rubbish. She said it was all a dream. How could a dream be that vivid? He overcame an addiction, was hung, avoided death, made friends, saved lives, and then drowned. All a dream? All one dream? 

Charlie shoved his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. He had forgotten how cold it was in Manchester. His body had become so used to the tropics of the island… Or was that his imagination? Or was _this_ his imagination? That thought only brought more. What is reality? What is a dream? What the hell?

"Everyone thinks I'm crazy," Charlie said to himself as he walked down the foggy street. He didn't know where he was walking, and frankly, he didn't care if he walked off a cliff. There was no point. If everything he had lived for the past months had been a lie, what use was there to living? His life had amounted to nothing without the island. He had done nothing productive or life changing. He had done nothing. 

But there _was_ someone who could do something. That he knew. 

Charlie's step quickened to a fast walk. A jog. A run. Finally, a possibility for answers. 

Once he reached his house, Charlie pounded up the porch steps and flew inside barely touching the tiled floor. 

"Charlie!"

Charlie stopped dead. Slowly, he turned around to face his scowling mother. She was the one who had sent him to the prison of a therapist's office. She was the one who thought he was losing his mind. She was the one thing standing in his way from answers.

"What has gotten into you?" she said in disbelief. "You have been acting like a mad man lately! Where is the Charlie that I know and love?"

"He drowned," Charlie said without missing a beat. He shuffled past her and up the stairs to his room. He needed cash. And a car to get to the airport. Liam? No, Liam would be just as bad as asking his mother. Perhaps he wouldn't ask. More like borrow and return later. Much later. 


End file.
